Ethereum Introduces ERC-8004 for AI Agent Infrastructure

• Ethereum introduces the ERC-8004 standard for AI agent identity and reputation.
• Standard uses three onchain registries enabling portable trust across platforms.
• ERC-8004 lets AI agents discover, verify reputation, collaborate, and settle payments across platforms.

Ethereum has introduced ERC-8004, a new technical standard developed by the Ethereum Foundation’s dAI Team in collaboration with MetaMask, Google, Coinbase, and other organizations. The standard provides infrastructure enabling AI agents to locate each other, evaluate reputations, request and compensate for services, and verify completed work through blockchain-based systems.

ERC-8004 uses three onchain registries providing agents with verifiable identity and reputation histories stored on Ethereum. The identity registry contains agent names, skills, and endpoints. The reputation registry maintains an immutable record of feedback belonging to each agent. The validation registry records proof that the agent’s work was completed correctly.

Registry System Enables Cross-Platform Portability

The three-registry architecture makes agent trust portable across different tools and platforms. Builders can access an agent’s established history without requiring reputation construction from scratch on every application or marketplace where the agent operates. For developers, this means a five-star agent history functions as an accessible asset across tools and platforms.

Agents enter an open, universal directory searchable across organizations, making it easier for developers to find, test, and integrate AI services into their technology stacks. The standard also supports agentic communication protocols such as A2A and MCP, as well as payment protocols such as x402. They will enable AI agents to find specialized counterparts, check reputation before interaction, delegate work assignments, verify job completion accuracy, and release payments upon validation.

ERC-8004 establishes what Ethereum terms the trust layer of a unified AI economy. AI agent software developers, MCP developers, and API developers can translate agent reputations into cross-platform assets. Marketplace and directory developers get a free, standardized, crawlable data layer. DeFi and Web3 developers can incorporate agents as economic agents with provable reputations.

Before ERC-8004, agent-to-agent commerce operated in fragmented conditions. The standard aims to unify this ecosystem by providing a common infrastructure for identity, reputation, and validation. This architecture allows agents to complete the full cycle from discovery through settlement using shared protocols and registries.

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